Minimum radius for staging?


R

Rigby

Member
ok, so I'm designing an 8' by 32" segment of my layout. The mainline will run around the outside edges. The transitions from the sides to the back of the segment will be hidden. What is the reasonable minimum radius for the curve? It looks like everything I read conflicts.
 
The minimum radius for staging isn't going to be any different than the minimum radius for your mainline because you need to run the same locomotives and cars in both places. If you can't maintain this radius, you have a fiddle yard, where everything will be done with an 0-5-0 switcher. :)
 
ok, good point. so let me ask a different question - can I run run 1940's period coaches on 19" curves? 11"? How about articulated steamers? I know they'll look better on bigger curves, and I'll have nice big curves elswhere, but what do I need, bottom line?
 
Rigby, as I remember, you are in N scale. It's always a good idea to state your scale with questions like this, BTW. 19" curves will run just about anything in N scale, including 80' long passenger cars, which is what I assume you mean by 1940's period coaches. 11" radius is starting to get tight for 80' foot coaches and I wouldn't want to try an articulated around an 11" radius curve. If you're really tight on space, I'd try for a 15" radius and then just watch your track centers because most rolling stock will make it but the overhang is something you'll have to consider for adjoining tracks.
 
While it's good to keep the min radius of the staging area the same as the rest of the layout, you also have to remember that if your min radius out there is more for realism (as in, looking good), you can get away with a lesser min radius in staging because nobody really sees the huge overhangs there. Unless, of course, you have visible staging.

As long as the min radius in staging is equal to the min radius recommended for the equipment, you should be OK. Out on the main line, your min radius should be greater, so the trains 'look right'.

Kennedy
 
Kennedy, I was going to say that.

Staging is just for storage. As far as I'm concerned it just has to work without derailing and be far enough from the other tracks to keep from bumping the other cars.
 
This was really what I was getting at - my first layout segment will be a 8' by 32" area with a yard and a couple of industrial sub-yards. The mainline will enter at 90 degrees to the front edge at the left side, curve around the rear, follow the rear edge, curve forward and exit the front right side, from the operator's perspective. The curves and rear track will be hidden for the most part, so I wasn't worried about prototypical look but didn't want to derail the train.

Since my post, I've thought further. There is no where on this layout to lay track more than 32 inches deep and the helix will have to max out at 24 inches to fit in its closet. So I'm limited to equipment that won't derail on 11" radius curves. That's ok though, because the prototypical lines were narrow and twisty, too.
 
Right - in this instance the helix is going to be hidden in a closet. There is 24" clearance, so that's that. But that become the limiting factor, rather than the curves at the back of the yard module.
 
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